About the poem

For soldiers in WWI, songs provided a much-needed pastime and way to express the fears they all felt in a light-hearted way.

Joking about bombs and poison gas helped calm their dread and boost morale.

In “A Poor Aviator Lay Dying” - set to the easily memorable tune of 'My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean" - soldiers use dark, morbid humour to portray the will and determination of the troops, even in the face of certain death.

In it, the dying aviator surrounded by the debris of his aircraft instructs his comrades to salvage the parts of the plane so that they can rebuild it and send another pilot off to fight.